SEBRING, Fla.—Rebellion Racing’s Neel Jani surprised everyone Friday afternoon (March 17) when he scored pole position for the 65th IMSA WeatherTech Mobil Twelve Hours of Sebring.
The Czech driver from the Swiss team set a new track record for the Prototype class, a class which has been dominated by the Cadillac DPis throughout the 2017 season. Cadillacs scored the pole and the win at the season-opening Rolex 24 and were quickest in most of the Sebring 12-Hour practice session.
As for Rebellion, its LMP2 Oreca-Gibson had been quick in testing for the Rolex, but was stricken with various mechanical ills and finished fifty laps down, despite qualifying third.
In practice for the 12-Hour, Rebellion managed fourth one and finished ninth in the other two sessions, while the Cadillacs took the top three spots in the last two session, and ran 2–3 in the first. No one expected anything but a Cadillac sweep in qualifying.
Then, when it counted Jani came out with a record-setting lap of 1:48.178 at 124.4. he took two laps to warm up his tires, uncorked his record-breaker, did two more just in case, and called it a day, while the rest of the Prototype teams scrambled to find an extra tenth, to no avail.
“We were close in Daytona,” Jani told IMSA.com. “This time it was enough to get pole. I was missing that pole position here so I’m happy to finally have grabbed it.”
